Using rocks and sticks to dig or hit or create chemical reactions (fire).

Writing down information on stones or in books.

And in a million other ways over the multitude of conscious millenium.

And more recently we are now living life vicariously through a little bit of glass, plastic and silicon.

The next step will be to directly interface with each sense. Google glass is showing the way, with a heads-up display of information supplemented by sound.

But how long will it be before we have direct implants into our brains to provide a whole range of additional inputs.

Initially maybe directly attaching to the optic nerve, and the signals coming from the ear. But then maybe adding direct hook-ups for smell, taste, touch. This is already being developed to help the sight impared, and I see no reason why it should stop there.

And maybe the next step should be to plug directly into memories, learning new things can be as simple as buying the module from amazon, and downloading.

And what about uploading, maybe we’re not that far away from brain backups. Keep a copy offline in case of a problem. Either do a disaster recovery or even run a copy in a disaster recovery center, basically running a copy of you in a computer or spare clone.

This may seem very weird, and fiction today. But with the rate and pace of technology development, and the changing perceptions of body augmentation, why not?

Maybe its decades, centuries or millennium away, but it seems like a reasonable extension of the human condition to continue to augment nature with technology.